After growing his hair for three years, an eight-year-old from Steinbach decided it was time to cut his hair and donate it to Angel Hair.

Angel Hair is an organization which accepts hair donations, uses those donations to make wigs, and then gives the wigs away to those who cannot afford to purchase a wig on their own and are suffering from an illness which stunts or prohibits hair growth.

Theresa Gillings is the mom to Brayden Gillings-Wassenaar, who decided to start growing his hair at five-years-old because he heard one of his cousins, Riley, had recently gone into remission after battling rhabdoid tumour, a rare childhood cancer which usually starts in the kidneys or brain.

She adds they chose to cut his hair on Wednesday because it was in conjunction with Pink Shirt Day, a day to talk about the negative effects of bullying and what people can do to change that kind of behaviour.

"A part of why we wanted to do it today is because Brayden has endured a lot of bullying about his hair. He has been picked on, he has been teased, he has been told he looks like a girl. He has fought through it all, he has stood by what he wanted to do to. So, it just lined up perfectly."

Gillings-Wassenaar says there have been classmates who weren't nice because he had long hair.

"Some of them would tease me and some of them actually complimented me. [When they teased me] I just thought, they're just trying to be mean, ignore it."

He says it felt weird to have 15-inches of his hair cut off because he had been growing it out for so long.

Gillings says she is proud of her son who, at five-years-old, put someone else ahead of himself.She adds Gillings-Wassenaar wants to grow his hair out again and continue donating it in support of his cousin.